Out of the Darkness and Into the Sun
by Spongyllama
Summary: Luke is desperate to keep his father alive after Endor, but he's the only one who thinks Vader should be allowed to live. Short post-ROTJ AU. Basically an alternate ending to ROTJ with less dancing and the same conclusion.


Leia and Han found Luke rushing through a corridor on the rebel flagship. They had gone looking for him after receiving reports on the moon's surface that he had appeared with a rather unexpected passenger. Despite having felt Luke after the Death Star blew up, seeing him in the flesh allowed her to really believe it for the first time.

"Luke!" Leia called to him. A fervent look was in his eyes; he almost didn't appear to recognize them at first.

"Han! Leia!" he exclaimed. "You're both all right?"

"We're fine, kid," Han said, putting his hands out to slow Luke down. "What about you? We were worried you wouldn't make it off the Death Star."

"I made it off just in time, and with –"

"We heard," Leia said, her tone dry. Her excitement to see her brother alive and well was almost completely tamped down by his overenthusiasm about his father – _their_ biological one – and the fact that that meant Vader was onboard somewhere. "Luke...how could you bring him here?"

"No, Leia, you don't understand – he _saved_ me, Leia. The emperor was trying to kill me and he saved my life. He killed the emperor and it almost killed him."

Leia was skeptical. Han was looking between them, uncomprehending. "Wait, why would Vader try to save you? This another one of his ploys to get you to join him?"

Luke shook his head. "Not this time. That's all over now – he – wait, Leia, you didn't tell him?"

Leia sighed. She wouldn't look either of them in the eye. "I told him we're twins," she said flatly.

"What else is there to know?" Han asked, confused.

Luke stared at Leia for a long moment before turning to Han. "Vader is our father," he said, his words somber but his eyes full of hope.

Han stared at him, dumbstruck. "Vader is – _what_?" He looked back and forth at each of the twins as if for a confirmation of what he didn't want to believe. "He – how long have you known all this?"

"I found out about me and Leia just after we left Tatooine," Luke said, looking away. "But Vader I found out on Bespin. I – I'm sorry I never told you, I just...I couldn't. I didn't want to think about how you'd react."

Leia was looking into space, her eyes distant. Han clapped his hand on Luke's shoulder. "We'd never treat you any different, kid. It's not either of your faults you were born to..." He trailed off, looking thoughtful. "Well, I suppose when word gets out that Darth Vader was really Anakin Skywalker, that is bound to change a few peoples' perceptions of things, but..." Leia glared at him, and he softened. "Hey, I didn't mean it like that. I'm sorry. I can just promise you that _I'll_ never treat you any different."

Leia kissed him on the cheek. Luke smiled. "Thanks, Han."

"But, Luke..." Leia said. "Did you really have to bring him here? He – he doesn't deserve to live."

"Leia, he's our father –"

"No," she said sharply. "He's _your_ father. My father was Bail Organa of Alderaan, a planet that was destroyed by Tarkin and Darth Vader and the rest of the empire. I watched it happen, Luke. He doesn't deserve to live." She sighed. "Just because I have some of his DNA doesn't mean he deserves any sympathy from me."

"I'm not asking you to give him sympathy," Luke said. "I'm not trying to ask _anything_ of you, Leia, other than that you let me try to help him. He was a good person, once, and I really believe that he can be again."

"You think a man with over twenty years of bloodshed and thousands of deaths at his hands should be allowed to remain alive?"

"I think that everyone deserves a chance to start over."

"He had his chance, Luke, and he took it when he chose the empire." Leia took his hand. "I know you care about him, but I don't think anyone can get over that kind of stain."

Luke looked down. "You should come see him. Just for a minute –"

She shook her head. "No," she said, "I can't. And I won't." Slowly, Luke nodded. "I'm going to go check in with the rebel leaders."

She wanted to stay with Luke. A part of her wanted to go find this man, her biological father, and yell and scream at him until he apologized to her on bended knee. She wanted to see him suffer. Mostly, she wanted him dead. And she wanted him to know she would never, ever forgive him the way Luke apparently had.

But she wouldn't. She would stay far, far away, because she didn't trust herself well enough to know what she would do if she actually confronted him.

Luke left to be with their – _his _ – father while she and Han went to speak with the rebel leaders. She was met with Mon Mothma, who greeted her warmly and told her she was thankful Leia had survived the surface battle.

"I suppose you heard about Commander Skywalker, and the special guest he brought aboard?" she said lightly, after a moment of catching up. Leia fought a sigh – a catastrophic battle and the defeat of an empire and this was all anyone could talk about.

"Yes, Han and I just spoke with Luke," she said. "I'm not sure I want to know what everyone else thinks."

A rebel in their conversation piped in, "He said Vader was his father. I always thought his father was that famous Jedi of old... I don't suppose that means..."

"It does," Leia confirmed, eager to end the conversation as soon as possible.

"That news took me by surprise as well, for many reasons," Mon said solemnly. "I met him, a few times, during the days of the Republic. He was different from the other Jedi, but I never saw anything negative about him. I can hardly believe that Vader was him all this time."

Leia frowned. "You knew him?"

"I didn't _know_ him, exactly, but I've spoken with him. He was friends with a few other senators at the time, including your father, Leia, and the senator from Naboo."

Leia's gut twisted. She missed Bail and Breha so much it hurt almost all of the time. She missed the mountains of Alderaan and Bail's loving smile and the way they raised her to be a proper princess when really all she had wanted was to fight the empire. Leia would never be ready to tell Mon Mothma how wrong she was because she desperately wished everything was as Mon said. She didn't want to find out that her biological father was a good person, she wanted to hate him and to keep on hating him until the day she died. That, however, didn't stop a driving curiosity.

"What was he like?" she said, as if the question was of no major importance to her.

"He seemed kind," Mon said, her eyes distant as she remembered a time long gone. "He was all over the Holonet as a hero during the war. I heard about him saving worlds and thousands upon thousands of people, but whenever I met him he seemed almost...humble. I can't imagine what happened to him to make him into the monster that Vader was, but in the end, I suppose it doesn't matter. Vader _was_ a monster. Or, is, I suppose. I just have trouble comprehending that he's the same person as the selfless hero the Republic seemed to worship."

It was too much. Leia swallowed heavily. "Excuse me," she said. "I should check on the other rebels."

She was not going to give Darth Vader a second chance. She loved Luke dearly, she always had, but she couldn't agree with him on this. She wasn't even going to try. But she also knew that she wasn't going to let anything hurt Luke the way that something had hurt Vader.

* * *

><p>Luke stood by his sleeping father's side, pondering the pale white skin burned so long ago. The rebel medics had refused to work on him, for which Luke couldn't exactly blame them, leaving unbiased, unfeeling droids to do all the work. Luke supposed Vader had known nothing else for the last twenty years.<p>

Being removed from the bulky armor of the life-support suit, though, had revealed just how much damage had been done to the man. All four limbs were made of metal, and all down his torso were wires and tubes that had been embedded into his skin long ago. The machinery was not well maintained, the droids said, and their logical databanks had not provided them with an understanding of why such an important figure in the galaxy would have such outdated and sometimes downright crude life support. Luke had to assume it really came down to what the emperor had allowed and what he had not.

A door slid open quietly and Luke looked up. Leia stood in the door by the discarded pile of black armor, visibly not eager to have made this house call. "Is he asleep?" she asked quietly, hovering by the door.

"I think so," Luke said, looking back down at the pathetic figure on the examining bed. More machines were plugged into his chest to keep him breathing and he had been set up with an additional tube in his nose. "Even when he's awake, I don't think he has the energy to move much."

"What happened, anyway?" Leia asked, trying not to look at Vader.

"The emperor was electrocuting me with some sort of Force power I've never seen," Luke said, running his own metal hand over the scar that ran down Vader's head. "Vader picked him up and threw him down a reactor shaft to kill him, but the electricity made his life-support short circuit and weakened his body even more. I...I just didn't know how bad the damage already was. I always imagined, but...seeing is different."

He looked up. "Why don't you come in?"

Leia shook her head. "I can't," she whispered.

Luke could understand. He had spent months after Bespin hating Vader's guts, wanting nothing to do with him, wanting him extremely and irreversibly dead. Then he had realized that maybe there was more to this than he thought. Maybe what seemed gone was not lost forever.

Leia's voice was a whisper. "Luke, I just...I only came here to ask you something, really. You already heard what I had to say. I don't think he should be alive. But if you do, then let me just ask you one question" She tried to gather the words. "Do you think he _wants_ this?"

He stared at her, his eyes sad. She pressed on. "I was just talking to Mon, and she said some things that got me thinking. I don't know what he was like before he was Vader, and honestly I don't really want to. But I know that if there is any possibility that he could become a decent person again, what decent person would want to live with what he's done?"

Leia cleared her throat, all the memories of what Mon had said about him saving thousands of lives coming back to her. She wondered how many of those saved lives he had later ended. "I'm not saying this to trick you into letting him die. I just...want you to think about it."

She was turning to leave when a ghostly, hoarse voice said, "She's right, you know." Leia whipped her head around to stare at the figure on the table. Luke similarly stared down at his father, leaning in close.

"Father?"

Vader could hardly speak let alone open his eyes to the bright medical room lights, but he managed to close his mechanical left fingers around Luke's.

"She's right, about everything," Vader said again. "This...isn't as comfortable as I'm sure it looks."

Luke frowned, staring at him. Vader tried again, slowly, although speaking at all clearly hurt. "Luke, the reason I'm like this is because I couldn't let go."

"What do you mean, Father?" Luke said, leaning in close.

"I thought that your mother was going to die, and the emperor told me that if I killed all the Jedi, I would be powerful enough to save her life. So I did it, and all the power went to my head and I ended up killing her myself." He grimaced, and not only from the pain.

"I...didn't know that," Luke said lamely, clutching his father's hand in his.

Vader managed to squint open his eyes and look at Luke. "I just don't want you to be like me. I know how much it hurts, and that's all right. But please...don't be like me. Everyone has a time, and this is finally mine."

Luke could feel tears stinging his eyes. "But just when you finally turned away from evil, Father – there's so much more that you can do for the galaxy. Good things. _Wonderful_ things."

Vader managed a smile. "I'll leave that up to my children."

Luke looked up at Leia, who was still standing against the door, her eyes fixed on their father as if mesmerized. She felt his gaze on her and met it steadily. Luke swallowed heavily.

"Are you sure this is what you really want, Father?" he said. Vader nodded as best he could.

"I just want you to know...both of you...that I'm so sorry for all the pain I've caused you. And...I know it doesn't mean much, but...I'm so proud of you."

Leia frowned, as if she didn't want a man who had ruined the lives of so many to be proud of her, but Luke smiled and let some tears roll down his cheeks. "Thank you, Father. For my life." He hesitated, his throat thick with emotion, and added, "And goodbye."

Vader's eyes slid closed involuntarily. Before Luke could reach for the life-support switch on the machinery beside him, however, a blue shimmer appeared in his peripheral vision. For a moment, he saw the spectral image of Obi-Wan put his hands over Vader's shoulders, and when he heard the old man speak it was an echo in his mind, as if they were words not meant for him to hear:

_Come home, Anakin...It's finally time for you to rest._

Luke snapped his vision to Leia, who looked at him blankly, as if afraid he was about to change his mind and keep Vader on life support indefinitely. She didn't seem to notice anything of what he had seen and heard. What he had felt, just then. After another brief look at his father's already peaceful face, he reached over and flipped the switch.

The last breath blew faintly out of his father's lips a moment later. Luke put his human hand on his father's shoulder, desperate for one last connection before the body vanished like Yoda's and Obi-Wan's had. He heard Leia cross the room to him, and after a moment she pried Luke's fingers away and turned his body to her. She hugged him tight.

"You did the right thing, Luke," she whispered into his ear. He said nothing as he held her back. A few minutes later, the body vanished and Leia, his beautiful sister, held him close.

* * *

><p>End note: I've never written this era before, so please let me know if you think any of the characterizations were wrong because I'm mostly in the dark here. Ha?<p>

The title is definitely from Breakaway by Kelly Clarkson.


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